Losing some days, stuck on Ch. 8

When did I originally say I was done with Ch. 8? Last Thursday? I'm still not satisfied with it, but after some more picking at it on Friday, thinking about it over the weekend, and some work this morning, I'm going to move on. Tomorrow I start Chapter 9/Part 2.

I think Chapter 8 probably has been harder because it's the climax of Part 1, and so, similarly to the climax of a whole book, though on a smaller scale, it has to resolve a lot questions elegantly and dramatically. And, unique to a transition from a major Part to another, it has to raise new questions that make the reader want to go on to the next section.

And it has to do all that in a way--as always--that integrates plot and character. It's so tempting just to shove the characters around and make them do what needs to be done in order to resolve the plot or move it along, but you end up with actions that don't seem to fit the characters that were established before. I guess that's what I mean by inelegant. I'm trying to get the inelegance out and the sense of integration in.

Anyway, Ch. 8 gets less and less clumsy and more and more dramatically compelling each time I go through it, but it's not there yet. I needed to slow down and take a good crack at it, and I've lost a few days off my schedule.

So, my plan to finish the read-through by the end of this week--4 working days left--is very improbable even without any roadblocks. Even without any personal or professional life, and I've been falling behind in both of those in order to get the work done the last few weeks.

So now I'm thinking the read-through is more likely to take 4 weeks total--until the end of next week. That would be about one chapter per week day from now until then, with a couple days of buffer.